Ling had been overlooking one thing, like a pebble kicked aside by a rushing tide.

Why is the place called the sea missing on human maps?

Simple: humans never found the sea, a horizon they never breached.

Humans guard their little acres like sparrows in a courtyard, with scant urge to fly.

Beyond their borders, the soil looks suspect like bruised earth; that’s one reason not to expand.

The real reason: they simply don’t need that heavy labor yet, like oxen resting at noon.

So scouting goes out by habit, like reeds bending to wind; scouts drift through duties with casual feet.

Sometimes they stumble on a broad lake, a mirror to the sky, yet it lacks the sea’s breath.

But humans don’t know; ignorance sits like fog over still water.

At any water’s edge, facing an endless gleam, laziness rises like warm haze and smothers curiosity.

They draw a careless circle on the map, coin-small or kettle-big, write ‘lake,’ and close the book.

Find a pond, it earns ‘giant lake’; find a great lake, it’s dubbed ‘small’; find the sea, they just draw bigger.

In the end, it still gets named Some-Whatever Lake, a label stuck like a wet leaf.

So lake or sea differs only by the scout’s mood, by the circle’s diameter, like rings in sand.

Never mind where the word ‘sea’ even came from; for humans it lives in novels and comics.

Alicia burns with fierce curiosity for the Underworld and other dreamed things; the sea sits inside that lantern.

Now she beholds the sea, feels the true gap from a lake, and her heart drums like surf.

Excitement wipes fatigue clean; energy floods her limbs like dawn tide; book-scene memories rise like gulls.

Among them floats the classic image—swimsuit girls by the shore, parasols like blossoms.

Pah! Is Alicia that sort? She didn’t come for Ling in a swimsuit; she came to chase a dream-sea.

Flag held high, she turns to Ling, eyes flashing with that brave-to-explore glint like starfire.

Ahem! Ling, did you guys bring swimsuits?

Ling hears the grubby thought and blushes like peach skin; she too imagines Alicia in a suit, slightly.

But—she came to find the Dragonfolk, not to swim; why would swimsuits sit in her first pack?

Only Arthas, Jiu Jiu, Alicia, and she are here; Edmund ‘volunteered’ under duress to guard the house.

No male creature stands nearby, like a quiet beach at dusk.

That doesn’t mean Ling will wear one; shame flares like a red banner at the thought.

That shameless garment—why does the world birth such embarrassing cloth, like fig leaves dyed neon?

Ahem, that’s only for herself; when others wear it, Ling’s gaze turns appreciative, like a painter’s eye.

So—

Too bad. I didn’t bring any, and I never would. If big sis did, little sis would despise you.

She sells it like truth, hoping the line makes Alicia drop the swimsuit idea like a hot coal.

No swimwear, no leverage; without that, Alicia can’t force her, right?

Alicia’s mood dips like a wave losing wind; what’s fun at the sea without swimsuits?

“Does Sister Alicia want something called ‘swimsuit’?”

Arthas, silent until now, steps into the talk like a bell chime, and Ling’s gut tightens.

Uh…

The ‘three great delusions’ probably need a fourth—‘I can skip the swimsuit (girl)!’

Arthas’s hands are porcelain-white; her armor, clunky as a shed shell, comes off at Alicia’s order.

The truth shows—a small girl, not the cute-petite type; her pallor carries a sickly beauty, like moonlight.

Scan—Tune—

Blue threads of mana bloom on her palms, twitching like lively silkworm silk.

Design—Build—

The threads twine in a rhythm like winter knitting, loops crossing like waves.

Arthas flicks a glance at Ling’s chest; pity ripples there like a raindrop.

Shape—A!

Nature’s magic answers the little voice, rustling like leaves; the price is mana spent in equal trade.

A swimsuit forms, shaped to fit Ling’s body like tailored cloud, paid for in breath and blue.

Sadly, it isn’t a school swimsuit; Arthas doesn’t know that word; it’s just a common cut.

Except one particular region looks especially flat, like a calm bay at low tide.

We overestimated Arthas’s imagination; the suit isn’t treasure; it’s orange-yellow, with no special pattern.

Only the lower half carries lace trim like frilled foam; the chest wears matching lace.

Ordinary, familiar; on Ling, it would look painfully cute, like sunshine on a kitten.

Alicia thinks so, bright as a lighthouse; Ling doesn’t.

She feels it—she feels the world’s malice brush her skin like dry sand.